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Morning all,
I'm writing sort of on behalf of my brother, who is the masher and owner, but also myself, as the former owner and 'mechanic'. I'm trying to understand why lil bro keeps breaking rear derailleurs, first on his XC/trail bike (2016 Radon Skeen 120) and now on his all-mountain/enduro (my former 2015 Bird Aeris Mk1). For his Radon I suspect it was due to pedalling hard during a front shift and not stopping at the first sign of trouble. I fitted another derailleur and converted him from 3x10 to 1x10, and no problems since, and he likes it. Then last August I sold him my freshly serviced Aeris with a 2x11 transmission and a tough overall build (DT Swiss EX1700 etc) for a really low price, which he had for about a month before sticking the derailleur into the spokes and ripping the whole thing off, plus almost tearing the hanger out of the frame (bent bolts there). He said it 'just happened' but I found some 12-15mm diameter wood jammed into the pedal that I suppose could have done for the transmission too. I fixed that last month and had it all running smooth, and the wheel re-tensioned in a local shop. Now he's done it again yesterday, snapped the derailleur clean off but claims the hanger is fine (possible?). He wants to go 1x, which is fine but I can't do it soon as he lives about 5 hours' drive from me, and it pains me to take a bike to a shop to change a chainring, remove a front derailleur etc.
I'm not criticising my brother, I am frequently knackering wheels, I just want to understand what leads some people to have repeated transmission failures so I can come up with a decent solution. I did think of putting him on a short cage Zee but that'd mean a new shifter and cassette as he's currently 11 speed and a bit short for cash. He also wants more than 11-36 range. A medium cage Deore is the cheapest solution I can think of to keep the same shifter and cassette. By way of details, I bought the Aeris as a Deore 2x10 and immediately converted to XT 1x11, and then to 2x11. I changed the original chainset from a Deore 24-36 to a M665 22-36, which with a 10-42 cassette gives enormous range. I am aware that this exceeds the capacity of the derailleur but this was never a problem as I don't cross-chain and told my brother not to either. I rode the bike like this through years of big mountain days in the Alps and Pyrenees and 1000s of local kilometres and have never had transmission problems on that or any other bike. Any kit or technique tips? My brother is a carpenter and helps me out with plenty of that at my house, so my wrenching for him is a sort of pay back but I don't want him to feel I ripped him off with my Aeris - it really was in great working order, fully stripped, cleaned, re-greased and properly torqued.
Cheers, G
I trash alot of mechs, I just moved form XTR to SLX and keep a stock in the shed
I would now love to go AXS but £600 a pop for mechs is not going to happen
As a side note, like you I used to trash alot of wheels. About a new rim every 6 months. 2 years ago I bought some Sixth Element carbon ones thinking the warranty was the answer to my problems (I figured they only cost twice my preferred EX511 build on Hopes so replace them once for free and I'm quids in) and turns out I have not managed to kill one yet in 2 years riding! They've been to Utah, Colorado, France, Italy, Switzerland, Scotland and ridden 4 WC tracks and about 2 million nasty cases so not had an easy life either
I have friend who does this. edit (apologies in advance for noobing you)
Are you sure he is gentle when he changes gear?
You have to kind of declutch ie take the power off when you shift and just rotate the gears so they can change, but not under any real load. If they are under load and transferring from one cog to another, the cage can twist, and then add more power it gets worse.
I have really had to put a lot of effort into teaching my kids this too.
My mate seems to have zero mechanical connection between his brain and his bike. He normally changes down (ie to an easier gear) half way up a steep climb whilst he is hammering on the pedals. I watched his sram xo mech explode (OK they did that anyway) but this was pure brute force driven.
No, I do suspect he's hard on the gears. I have a Rohloff on my commuter so am fully used to unloading for changes. I think getting rid of the front shifter will help him.
My kids are just getting used to the idea that if they look up, they can see the hill coming and change down in advance..
In my case it was solved by going back to Shimano. I killed multiple X0, X9 and X7 mechs in a single summer before admitting defeat.
I've now got GX, but promised myself it'll be swapped to SLX if/when it dies.
I am aware that this exceeds the capacity of the derailleur but this was never a problem as I don’t cross-chain and told my brother not to either.
My money is on this being the culprit though if you're using the 1x11 XT mech. That means you can't use ~22-11 in the granny, or 32-42 in the big ring. That means you have to remember to shift up/down only in the very middle of the cassette.
Even the mechanically challenged should be able to convert to 1x, just send him a link to the correct chainring, bolts (I'd suggest truvative/sram as they have a torx on the back not the little slot that requires the special tool). The rest is just cut the cable and remove the mech+ sifter.
I agree with thisisnotaspoon, I hate sram gears now as the mechs have always been fragile compared to shimano.
XTm8000 seems to take years of abuse.
If he was cross-chaining to those extremes there is no hope...! Seriously, it was a great set up for me. 36-10 is as fast as I would ever need to go and 22-42 crawls up just about anything even when you're knackered. I am sure my brother could bolt the bits on, it's more the cables where I have doubts. Thanks for the inputs all, hopefully I'll see him before too long (...) to put it right again (I have a single ring guide and bash to fit too).
If someone can learn to lift the accelerator pedal when changing gear in a car, they can learn to ease up when changing gear on a bike.. Learned to do that back in the days of Shimano 400LX! Never trashed a rear mech. Some people just don't appreciate the concept of mechanical sympathy and will always break stuff.
Worth looking at the new Shimano 12sp Hyperglide MegaSuperAersomePlus, out whatever it's called? Advertised as able to change up and down under power, and certainly feels eerily good at it in the few times I've managed to try and ignore 25 odd years of not smashing mechs!
I had an ebike behind me yesterday and he diverted off the cycle path and along a trail in the trees. I put a bit of extra effort in to try and haul my singlespeed to the other end first.
Right at the end were some wooden steps, he stood up and at the same time dumped several gears which made me wince. He got another couple of pedal strokes in whilst the drivetrain destroyed itself, it was a horrendous noise, I'm certain he destroyed the mech, hanger, chain and about half the drive-side spokes. Right in front of a walker he had just shot past as well.
I felt a bit guilty for not trying to help, but from the sound it made, I doubt there was anything left to repair, and I can't see bodging a singlespeed on a full suss E-bike being very successful. Plus he was opposite a train station...
spooky - sounds like my mate, he is an animal.